Hi everyone! I always frequent this site and never contribute to anything so here it goes!
I passed NCLEX on June 4th. I referred to this site for people's opinions on study material and I received a lot of great help. I took the exam almost a month post graduation. I wanted to take the test sooner but I messed up on my ATT info, thus had to wait.
What I used to study: ATI was intertwined all throughout our nursing program. Post graduation, I attended the ATI live 3 day review because it was included in our tuition. The teacher was amazing and it was helpful. After attending this review I decided that I was good on my content so I was just going to do questions. I had a old version of Lipincotts Q &A (paid 1$ on amazon for it,) Saunders, Lipincotts alternative item format (GET THIS BOOK) and Lacharity. Honestly, I only used Lacharity for the definition of prioritization and the three level definition it gave. Otherwise I never touched it.
I also did questions from Prep U (included in nursing school) and old ATI practice exams.
How I put it all together: So I set a goal to do 4000 questions by test date. I did a minimum of 150 questions a day and looked up things that really stumped me or I did not remember. I did not do 150 all at once, I would not have retained anything. I divided it up throughout the day, pretty much whenever I felt like doing questions.
Out of all of these resources I would have to say that Prep U was the BEST! The type of questions they ask are very similar then NCLEX (NCLEX for sure is easier than a level 8 with Prep U.) Also, using the Alternative format item book= do it. I recieved 35 m/m, 7 drag and drop and 2 picture labeling questions. I feel I would not have been able to survive those if it was not for that book. All of the other resources were good, but just for the questions. I would have to say that I only got one question on NCLEX that I had no idea what it was.
PEARSON VUE TRICK: It worked for me and other students from my class that took NCLEX around when I did. I did the trick 1 hour after the test, and it worked. I kept doing the trick (esp 24 hours after) and it never changed (I used a card with not enough money in case it did try to charge me.) Later on the day I checked the continental testing site (use this if Illinois resident, free and comes up before Pearson) and i had a big fat PASS on the site. I did pay for my quick results the next day but yes it also said PASS!!!
Ok that is all I have!! Good luck future nurses!
